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	(Anonymous) 2005-11-10 07:31 pm UTC (link)
	Her confession to the scam is locked -- any way to sum it up? Queencallipygos on LJ (Reply to this)(Thread)

hangingfire
2005-11-10 07:48 pm UTC (link)

In a nutshell, "I did it, I'm sorry, I'm a loser, but I'm unemployed and stupid, and I wanna make things right and I will as soon as I'm employed again."

Boy, what a winner this one is. It sounds like the threat of MASSIVE LEGAL ACTION scared the pants off her, really.

As for those victimized in the scam, I do think that in hindsight, it's really odd that someone would have that many LEs and hard-to-finds (all those single notes?). On the other hand, BPALers for the most part play by the rules, so one tends to get fairly trusting.

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	bangoskank 2005-11-10 10:04 pm UTC (link)
	And it's true that 99% of the people you deal with on the boards are honest and trust-worthy. It just takes that one asshole to make everyone paranoid. (Reply to this)(Parent)

	stardefiant 2005-11-10 07:35 pm UTC (link)
	Dammit you beat me to this one! Some serious flapping going on. I believe the technical term is running about like chickens with their heads cut off. (Reply to this)(Thread)

	wanktastic 2005-11-10 07:55 pm UTC (link)
	Dammit you beat me to this one! Ha! Well, someone still needs to post about the big BPAL vs. Atropa's Cottage kerfuffle that just went down on the forum, so there's a job for you. g (Reply to this)(Parent)

	psychofangirl 2005-11-10 07:36 pm UTC (link)
	OH! I knew it'd get here eventually! I was wondering if I should post it, but then realized that it was too much for me. Glad to see it here and I'm glad I didn't get anything from mizzanthrope. I was tempted though... (Reply to this)(Thread)

wanktastic
2005-11-10 07:53 pm UTC (link)

I was tempted at first but after the third or fourth post she made like "Look, I suddenly found MORE single notes and discontinued blends I can sell!" I knew it couldn't end well. I mean, there's wanting to think the best of people and then there's being a complete idiot and ignoring warning signs. The girl definitely needs to refund everyone but the ones who bought from her need to stop acting so 1. victimized and 2. proud for ferreting her out.

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	psychofangirl 2005-11-10 07:55 pm UTC (link)
	Well, I can't say I blame them. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

telophase
2005-11-10 08:36 pm UTC (link)

I was doing a lot of the sleuthing Wednesday morning (hey, I'm a librarian, research is what I do), but taking it to her and directly accusing in the absence of anything but circumstanial evidence was a bit farther than I was willing to go, despite my suspicions. (and after a quick glance at the community this morning to see her first post, I stayed the hell away to keep any temptation to wank as far away as possible).

All her contriteness or whatnot isn't really going to do much good - it's already been reported to the Internet Fraud Commission, and I don't think the ones repoting it are in any mood to retract their complaints.

She really wasn't that good at hiding her tracks: I can't believe someone planning to defraud people would actually use an alias she'd used before as a Paypal address.

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telophase
2005-11-10 08:42 pm UTC (link)

ETA: Wait, is BPAL a fandom? Should this be in [info]fandom_wank instead?

Ehh, it's been there before, which leads to more "Is BPAL really a fandom?" comments.

I was tempted to post it, but it'd have to have been in

i_wank in that case, since I was in there searching away. ~~and, dammit, found all that info before anyone else did! /wank But at least I didn't order anything from her.~~

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	antigone 2005-11-10 08:42 pm UTC (link)
	This is fascinating. O.o' Scams like this (from little like the kitten one to bigger like the BoE one) are so train-wreck for me. I can't find where the bit about the FBI friend is mentioned. Is that in Link 3 or Link 4? (Reply to this)(Thread)

	wanktastic 2005-11-10 08:50 pm UTC (link)
	It's in the comments to brambled's first post to the community. (Reply to this)(Parent)

	karina 2005-11-10 08:58 pm UTC (link)
	LOL! Swaplifter wank! Don't think the thief will return their money either. (Reply to this)

	the_wanlorn 2005-11-10 09:07 pm UTC (link)
	Shades of a burned kitty. (Reply to this)

	jfpbookworm 2005-11-10 09:44 pm UTC (link)
	My opinion? I think those who were so eager to pay for oils that are known to be difficult to obtain from a user who provided no prior selling history or references were practically begging to get fucked up the ass without lube. Dude, it's fraud. The prospective purchasers aren't the ones at fault here. (Reply to this)(Thread)

	wanktastic 2005-11-10 09:55 pm UTC (link)
	At fault? No. Could have prevented it from happening simply by asking the seller if she had any references or previous selling history that could be verified? Yes. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

telophase
2005-11-10 10:09 pm UTC (link)

If she's telling the truth in that she'd purchased oils from people on the comm before, then those would have been accepted as references, I suspect.

I will point out, however, that most victims of any sort of fraud could have figured it out easily (money from Nigeria? Perpetual motion? Real estate sold by guys in bad suits out of the backs of offices?). Perpetrators rely on their trust, and prey on that trust. Pointing and laughing at the victims encourages others who are victims of fraud not to report it because they're embarassed and the perpetrator get off scot-free and does it again. And again.

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	narcissam 2005-11-10 10:54 pm UTC (link)
	I think that my level of sympathy depends on how much money is lost, not how silly the scammed person was. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	telophase 2005-11-10 10:59 pm UTC (link)
	Yah. Here, I think the most any individual person lost was $49, and the total take was less than $500, so it's not like anyone lost their life savings. But it's well worth reporting her to the Internet Fraud Commission; even if nothing else happens, she's got a complaint on file now for when she attempts to defraud someone else. (Reply to this)(Parent)

	wanktastic 2005-11-10 10:56 pm UTC (link)
	But...but... I thought this was the gathering hole for pointing and laughing. Did I get lost again? :( WHERE DO I GO FOR THE POINTING AND LAUGHING PLZ ADVISE KTHX. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

telophase
2005-11-10 11:09 pm UTC (link)

Mm. It all depends on your personal level of ethics. Me? I point and laugh at a hell of a lot of Internet drama, but tend to draw the line at victims of crime, no matter how blind they were. The way I put it: laughing at a Harmonian wank doesn't do any serious harm. Laughing at fraud victims encourages others not to report the crime due to embarassment at their stupidity. My personal code of ethics won't let me cross that line. YMMV.

Instead, I prefer to point and laugh at the actual criminal. Who is affording me quite a bit of entertainment in this particular case, from her sunny "What? I know nobody of that name! Here, I did a search on a different spelling for no apparent reason and found her!" yesterday to the tearful "I only did it because I was staaaaaarving!" confession of today, and her lack of clue in between that using one of her online handles in the commission of a criminal act was perhaps not the most intelligent act in the world.

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	bangoskank 2005-11-10 09:58 pm UTC (link)
	How the hell did she think she was going to get away with that? At least city_glitter had the creativity to invent a burned cat. Kids these days. (Reply to this)

	hysteria 2005-11-10 10:56 pm UTC (link)
	Those must be some damn good perfumes. :o (Reply to this)(Thread)

	lurker32 2005-11-11 12:07 am UTC (link)
	Patchouli with undertones of pure crack, perchance? (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	sesana 2005-11-11 05:16 am UTC (link)
	So that's the note that I wasn't able to identify in my imp of Arachne. It all makes sense now. (Reply to this)(Parent)

	snacky 2005-11-10 11:14 pm UTC (link)
	ETA: Wait, is BPAL a fandom? Should this be in fandom_wank* instead?* I think the last BPAL wanks were in f_w. It's close enough to a fandom in any case. If you want to move it, I'd say go for it. (Reply to this)(Thread)

	wanktastic 2005-11-10 11:18 pm UTC (link)
	Will do. Thanks! (Reply to this)(Parent)